Business Leader

In this new podcast series, Richard Harpin, who built Homeserve into a £4.1bn business, explores his nine steps to building a billion-pound business. In episode two, Richard speaks with Steve Hewitt, the former chief executive of Gymshark, about three of his steps. These steps are: -Bricks, clicks and paper -Hire your replacement -Go global with locals To find out more about Richard’s nine steps a...

The financial crisis nearly destroyed Britain's banks, but from the remnants of this chaos the Business Growth Fund was created. BGF, backed by the biggest UK banks, is now the most active investor in small and medium-sized businesses in the country. If the UK is to turn more promising businesses into large companies then BGF will be key. It has already invested £4.5bn into more than 600 businesse...

In this new podcast series, Richard Harpin, who built Homeserve into a £4.1bn business, explores his nine steps to building a billion-pound business. In episode one, Richard speaks with Touker Suleyman, the Dragons' Den star, about the first three of his steps. These steps are: -Copy and pivot -Get an investor -Get some coachment To find out more about Richard’s nine steps and how to build a succe...

Sir John Hegarty is one of the most revered figures in the UK advertising industry. Starting out in ‘swinging Sixties’ London, he went on to be a founding partner of Saatchi & Saatchi in the 1970s and co-founder of Bartle Bogle Hegarty (BBH) in the early 1980s. With BBH he masterminded adverts that became part of the national conversation, including the Levi's 501 jeans adverts...

GoFundMe is one of the world’s biggest crowdfunding platforms. It focuses on charitable donations and has generated over $30bn in funds since it launched in 2010. It is based in San Diego, California and has more than 800 employees. But it has been led by a Brit, Tim Cadogan, since 2020. Dougal Shaw speaks to Tim Cadogan in the latest episode of the Business Leader Podcast. Cadogan grew up and stu...

Kenny Wilson speaks to Graham Ruddick about the story behind how Dr Martens, the famous footwear brand, trebled its annual revenues to £1 billion while he was chief executive. It is a story that begins with Kenny Wilson as a promising footballer at Aberdeen while Sir Alex Ferguson was manager, involves learning about brand and leadership at Levi's, and has some challenges along the way... Business...

What are the business books you should be reading right now? What are the leading CEOs and founders reading? Josh Dornbrack, Graham Ruddick and Sarah Vizard get together to discuss what the business world is reading and what they would recommend to you. Plus, they do a blind-ranking of some all-time classics... Business Leader is a membership community for ambitious CEOs and founders of mid-sized...

Who are the fastest-growing businesses in the UK and what are the stories behind them? Graham Ruddick, Sarah Vizard, Dougal Shaw and Robert Watts get together to discuss what Business Leader has founded by building the Growth 500, the most comprehensive guide ever to Britain's fastest-growing businesses Business Leader is a membership community for ambitious CEOs and founders of mid-sized UK compa...

Imran Hakim is a serial entrepreneur and has built Hakim Group into a collection of independent opticians across the UK. But he also found extraordinary success through Dragons Den and invented a toy that became one of the UK's most popular Christmas presents. In this episode of the Business Leader Podcast, Victoria Price speaks to Imran Hakim about building his business, Dragons Den and the chall...

Nick Grey is the founder and owner of Gtech, which he has built into a multi-million-pound technology business. Gtech started out with vacuum cleaners, but has since expanded into power tools, hair dryers and much more. Grey is the inventor behind many of its original designs, initially working from his home in Worcestershire. He founded Gtech in 2001 having previously worked as a window-fitter on...

Graham Ruddick and Sarah Vizard are joined by Rob Watts and James Whittaker, the head of UK wealth management and chief executive of Deutsche Bank UK, to discuss what it takes to build a billion-pound business in the UK. Who are the people who have done this? What are their stories? And what are the 56 businesses on Business Leader's list of Great British Billion-Pound Businesses? All this and mor...

Dougal Shaw checks-in to a Yotel for a guided tour of the business with CEO Hubert Viriot. The brand is known for its compact, functional but stylish designs. It was started by British entrepreneur Simon Woodroffe, who also founded the Yo! Sushi food chain. Inspired by high-end, long-haul travel and the minimalism of Japanese hotels, he opened the first Yotel at Gatwick Airport in 2007. The idea w...

Bruce Bratley has gone from studying for a PhD to building one of the UK’s most successful recycling businesses. He founded the waste management and recycling company First Mile in London in 2004. It now has 200 employees, an annual turnover of £50m and helps more than 30,000 businesses around the UK with recycling solutions. Its clients include large companies like Pret, Caffè Nero, Netflix...

Graham Ruddick meets Joe Lister, the chief executive of Unite Group, to hear the story behind how this business went from a student start-up in Bristol to a FTSE 100 company. Unite's unique culture is at the heart of it all... Business Leader is a membership community for ambitious CEOs and founders of mid-sized UK companies, designed to help them grow with purpose through strategic support, peer-...

Here are three business leaders who all have one thing in common - they lead US-based, SaaS companies valued at more than $1 billion. SaaS (software as a service) businesses are the lifeblood of the modern economy. Their products help with everything from sales calls and marketing to employee onboarding and supply chain management. These days all companies are awash with data, but artificial...

Highland Europe was founded on the basis that promising European businesses, including those in the UK, can take on the US tech giants if they get the right funding. In this episode of the Business Leader Podcast, Fergal Mullen, the co-founder of Highland Europe, explains what he looks for in founders and promising businesses (and what he avoids). And why Europe could take on the US by merging the...

Julia Pyke is joint managing director of the Sizewell C nuclear plant and she thinks nuclear power has an image problem. She blames a lot of this on The Simpsons cartoon and in particular, the evil character Mr Burns. However, as Pyke explains to Dougal Shaw, she is trying to challenge that stereotype while building Sizewell C in Suffolk, which is due to switch on in the mid-2030s. The UK hasn’t t...

Thomson Reuters is a modern news and information giant. It is worth more than $85 billion (£64 billion) and is one of the leading sources of news around the world. Paul Julius Reuter started Reuters with an office in 1851. Since then it was the first to tell the world about the sinking of the Titantic, the construction of the Berlin Wall and, in more modern times, that Mark Zuckerberg planned...

Dougal Shaw takes a trip to the Comedy Store in central London to meet a legend of improvisational comedy, who has a few tricks he can teach businesses. Neil Mullarkey has been performing with the Comedy Store Players every week for three decades. He has also worked closely with Mike Myers, who starred in the Austin Powers films. These days, as well as performing unscripted comedy, Mullarkey runs...

Andrew Jones was the director of a FTSE 100 company and highly regarded in the business world. But he was concerned he was missing a big opportunity. So, inspired by Warren Buffett, Jones decided to risk his career and launch his own business. It proved to be a great decision. In this episode of the Business Leader Podcast, Andrew Jones tells Graham Ruddick what happened next - he built a new FTSE...

Jake Humphrey has spent years examining the habits of world-class performers. In this episode of the Business Leader Podcast, Graham Ruddick and Josh Dornbrack sit down with the Business Leader columnist and host of the High Performance podcast to find out how you can apply these principles to build high-performing teams and cultures. From managing confidence to maintaining momentum, he offers pra...

Graham Ruddick travels to Bolton, Lancashire, to hear how John Roberts built AO.com into a leading online electricals retailer with more than £1bn of revenue and 12 million customers. AO is one of few online success stories in the UK and it all started with a £1 bet. Since it was founded in 2000, AO's story has included a high-profile stock market flotation, a U-turn on the chief executive positio...

In a special series for the Business Leader Podcast, Victoria Price is meeting entrepreneurs from around the UK to hear the personal stories behind their success. In the third episode, Victoria Price speaks to Henrietta Rix, the co-founder of Rixo, about building a new fashion brand. Victoria Price is head of private capital at Alvarez & Marsal, the consultancy firm, and has spent over 20 year...

Are you ready to take a tour of a uniquely British organisation? The Ordnance Survey was founded in the 18th century to protect Britain from Napoleon’s armies. Its job is to map Britain in detail. That task didn’t change that much for two centuries. But now it's undergone a digital reboot. Dougal Shaw went to meet the CEO Nick Bolton to find out how modern maps are made, which includes the Nationa...

In a new limited series for the Business Leader Podcast, Victoria Price meets entrepreneurs from around the UK to hear the personal stories behind their success. Victoria Price is head of private capital at Alvarez & Marsal, the consultancy firm, and has spent over 20 years in professional services in a collection of senior roles.  In the second episode of the series, Victoria Price speak...